Historical Prologue Stepping her feet into the Winterbourne River, Ewa felt the coolness of the water relax the aching pain of having walked all the way from London. With only a few coins left in her money pouch, Ewa prayed she would make it to Bath soon. The Roman village she was resting in was named Maro. Picking her feet out of the river, Ewa looked back at the village and the hill that sat behind it. Approximately 34 Meters high, the hill rose up and loomed behind the village. The rising sun was peeking over the hill now. Ewa knew she had to move on towards Bath soon. As the sun started gliding upwards and casting it's glowing rays upon the town, Ewa saw something glinting in the sunlight on the hill. Mystified, Ewa only wondered for a moment upon it. Grabbing her little daughter, Ewa swung the child into her sash and strode over to the large raft that was loading it's last passengers to cross the Winterbourne River. Nearly fifteen minutes later, the raft pushed itself on the opposite shore. Ewa and the other passengers stepped off and started making their trek towards Bath. After 20 minutes had passed, a small army of 350 men swarmed into the town of Maro and killed nearly every living resident, with only about 20 some people who had fled in the chaos. The men raped, pillaged and plundered what valuables could be had.

March 14, 2008. An archaeological dig upon the hill that overlooked the Winterbourne River revealed an army of stone sculptures with many gemstones used as earrings or necklaces. The dig also included the old Roman village of Maro and it's story of assault. Ashton Kirchbauer strode over to the main tent to say something about a discovery he had just made to Summer Pitt, the leader of the dig. The red flowing hair and her opaque green eyes turned towards Ashton and his breath got caught for a moment as his mind raced to form the words that finally came out. "A very intriguing vase was found, Summer, I think you should take a look at the contents." Summer followed Ashton and when they reached the spot where Ashton had put it, another member of the team was staring inside it with a strange expression. "What is the matter, Drew?" asked Ashton. "The seeds appear to be aging rapidly, Ash." "Summer, my theory may be correct about these seeds. They could very well be the seeds of knowledge from the Gaokerena, otherwise known as the tree of knowledge. It was known to be the roost of the Simorgh, the persian name of the Phoenix. . It roosted in the tree of life, Gaokerena, and lived in the land of the sacred Haôma plant, whose seeds could cure all evil. In later Iranian lore, the Simorgh became a symbol of divinity. Sçnmurw/Simorgh is also identified as Homâ in Persian literature and in Arabic introduced as the Rukh (the origin of the English word "Roc"). When the Simorgh took flight, the tree of knowledge's leaves shook making all the seeds of every plant to fall out. These seeds floated around the world, taking root to become every type of plant that ever lived, and curing all the illnesses of mankind. "

As Ashton talked excitedly about the contents of the Vase, Drew strode away, only glancing back once, then he sped up and entered his tent with the pouch of seeds that he had taken a sampling of. Reaching into his pocket to open it momentarily, he looked at them again and slipped it back into his pocket. Kneeling down on the ground in a gesture of prayer he slid the radio out from under the bed and typed a message to his contact. Hitting the send button, a microburst of radiowaves beamed into suborbital space and bounced off a satellite and was sent at the speed of light back down to earth into an office in Dubai, where an executive of an American oil company received the message.

At Fort Meade in Maryland, the microburst message flickered onto a solenoid that recorded the message. The solenoid was one of several hundred thousand that were embedded into a microchip the size of fingernail. The information was processed fifteen minutes later in the hard drive of the DRAM-101 Supercomputer where the software programming picked up only four of the twenty-two word message and spat them out onto a laser typed report that was several hundred pages long. One of the many statistical aides took the report out of it's tray and took it to a central desk where one of the four supervising analysts sat, poring over the long reports. Mimosan Adelson, the second in charge of the four supervising analysts picked up the new report after finishing his seventh report of the day and skimmed through each page with a highlighter, marking certain phrases. On page 779 Mimosan came across the recent addition and marked it with the highlighter. Later, after many of the employees of the NSA left for home, Nandoor Josef, a Geographical Information Specialist came to work for his second shift job. After spending nearly four hours poring over the many reports, he rubbed his eyes and took a fifteen minute break. Dark haired and with glasses that attracted attention to many non intellectuals to easily categorize him. Nandoor did not mind the stereotyping but still felt a latent need to be one of the accepted people of this country. Returning to work after munching on a ham and cheese sandwich and carrot sticks, Nandoor sat down and started reading the next report. On page 779, Nandoor noted the four word phrase and wrote it down on a memoradum sheet. After finishing the report, he noted the numbered sequence of the report and went to the nearest computer to boot up the whole message. Very interesting indeed, he thought and wrote a one page report stating his reasons why this message could be of importance.

The next morning Summer, as she walked into the mess tent, groped for the coffee pot, only to find that someone had already fill it and it was piping hot. Odd, she thought, everybody is still asleep. Oh, well, was her second thought. Feeling secure, she took no notice of her surroundings as she sat down in a random chair. “Morning, beautiful,” said a voice from right behind her. Summer jumped and in her fright knocked her coffee mug over. She slowly turned around and breathed a sigh of relief. “Let me get you another cup,” said her father as he pick up the mug. "So how is every thing going?" he asked her.

"Just fine, Pop" Summer replied with a winning smile for her dad. "That's terrific, hon" "What brings you here daddy?" "A speech in London at the Marine Sciences Institute. Thought I would pop over here and check on you and see how things are here. I heard about the theft of some of the seeds when I got in late last night. You had already gone to bed and Ashton filled me in." "How long will you be here?" 'The speech is later this afternoon, so I will have to take the train back into London after 12:30 pm. So we have just a few hours to visit. I would like to go see the stone sculptures with the gemstones." The two of them stand up and walk out of the mess tent and begin the trek towards the hill as the morning sun begins it's ascent above the hill.

As they crested the hill, they were met with confusion. Everbody was running around like chicken with their heads cut off. Summer tried unsucessfully to get someone's attention to find out what was going on. Ashton finally saw her and walked over. "What's going on?" Summer asked. "They're gone!" was all he could say. "What is gone?" asked Dirk. "The stone statues" was the answer.

During the previous night, two chinook helicopters outfitted with silenced engines had airlifted the statues that had been excavated by handbrush over the past year and stolen with military precision and expense, figured Dirk with some thought.

Huh, as far as I know, you can't possible silence a helicopter.

Summer stared at the fuss going on and groaned. This was the last thing she needed.

Summer walked back to the camp stewing over the fiasco of losing such an archaeological find. Dirk began thinking hard and long and began going over the ground where the statues had been and found the indentations in the ground where the skid had been placed under the statues and lifted. Enough material had been loosened from the statues in the process and had fallen to the ground where Dirk began collecting each sample and wrapped it in his T shirt that he had taken off to wrap it all in. Returning back to the camp just before the arrival of his taxicab, he gave Summer a quick kiss and told her not worry about anything because it was all for nothing. Summer's jaw dropped as Dirk walked towards the taxicab with a wave and a knowing smile that told Summer that he knew something. Utterly frustrated, Summer let out a few expletives as the taxicab drove away in the sunlight of the morning.

Walking into the Eleventh floor operations room where MAX was kept, Dirk saw a gray haired man in dirty old jeans scrambling around on the floor with his hands in the labyrinth of the Supercomputer that was known as MAX. Dirk smiled and walked over to the desktop of MAx and knocked on the wrist rest portion. Hiram pulled his head out of the guts of the computer and saw Dirk, smiled and held up a finger to let Dirk it will be a moment. MAX appeared and said hello to Dirk. Dirk replied with a stunned look of appreciation of a full human figure of MAX. MAX smiled. "MAX, is it just right, now?" "Yes, Hiram" MAX replied. Hiram wiggled out of the computer and replaced the panel.

"Hello, MAX, you look stunning as ever" Dirk asked. "What would you like me to do for you Dirk?" MAX returned with a knowing smile. She knew Dirk would require her to do some extensive research.

"MAX, can you research some material on an element that I have discovered recently, please" asked Dirk. Within 10 minutes, MAX came back with her report: "One scientist named Hiram Clive Cussler, born 1877, died 1963. According to his findings he had theorized an element that would be found, eventually. And indeed, the element, was rediscovered in the 1970s in the French Alps. Accordingly, the element was named Cusslerite, after the scientist. It is number 124 on the Periodic chart, part of the Serite group that has come to light in the past fifteen years as a result of the work on Cusslerite material. According to historical records the Cusslerite was used at one time back during the days of the Roman Empire but lost to history during the Dark Ages. News of a strange discovery in Transylvania during the days of Vlad Dracul, the mysterious element had been used for experimental purposes during torture but had never been confirmed as the element. That is all I have been able to confirm despite some oral testaments of a race of humans who had come to Earth back during it's formative stages and had used a strange element in transforming Earth into it's present stage.".

"Wait a minute Max, are you saying that humans from another planet created the earth we know today? I find that very interesting, indeed." commented Dirk.

"Hold on," asked Hiram. "Did you just say something about dracula?" "No, Hiram!" replied MAX. MAX stated that it was her educated belief that other humans from another planet had the technology to terraform the young planet into it's present state. "Terraforming a planet is the process of man-made or alien technology to create a livable planet from it's young molten stage into a living and breathing planet that can handle the new residents. "

Um, I'm lost. I know that some members can edit other peoples post but it usually says that at the bottom. Also I know that I originally only wrote the first two sentences. It would show up that I edited the post. Same with my prior post, it has also been edited but the little notice that said it was is not there. What is going on? Or am I just being goofed? I don't mind at all if someone edits my posts.

Okay, now one of the edited by is showing up.

"Okay, let me get this straight." Dirk said. "Humans from some far away planet actually helped earth become what it is today?" "Yes" replied MAX.

224 AD. Ansodimare Estate. In what is now Southwest England, the Mansion that is known as the home of the DiMare family was the setting for one of the most powerful families of the English Isles. Several miles from the Winterbourne River, Edward DiMare sat in his study in the Ansodimare manse. Listening to the messenger who had run for several miles to bear the news of the mass slaying at Maro, Edward was ashen at the news and decided to ride to the village and see for himself. Standing up, he grabbed the Kamal before heading to the livery where the carriage was kept. Upon arrival at Maro, Edward was enraged and learned from one of the few survivors that it was Roman soldiers who were responsible. The survivor was an old man who also informed him that the village had been attacked before many years ago. The old man told of a story he had learned as a child about the villagers who had built replicas of the soldiers and how over time they had been buried by the hill that sits behind the village. Edward rode up to the top of the hill and instructed his slavemaster to dig. After several hours of the hot sun burning them, the slavemaster had uncovered a portion of the stone soldiers. Walking over to one of the stone soldiers, Edward DiMare chipped off a part of the rock from one of the soldiers and ordered the slavemaster to cover over the dig. At the age of 46, Edward had traveled over a good part of the Roman Empire including the capitol, Rome. One of the things he learned while in Europe was that some of the Roman soldiers were practitioners of Mithraism, a secret religious rite whose origins was steeped in mystery and had been supposedly founded by Zoroaster in Persia. Without a doubt in his mind, Edward knew he had to seek revenge upon Roman soldiers and if possible strike at one of the weak points of the poweful Roman Empire.

Edward walked away from the stone solider. He looked across the Winterbourne River. He had hope, but so far nothing had been found. He had heard that some of the villagers had escaped on rafts but none of the survivors could remember if a woman with a young child was with them.

In his mind, Edward knew that he would never see Ewa and the child again, no matter what he thought as long as there was still a chance to have a son within his lifetime. His daughter was lost to him forever.

Ewa sat on the edge of the street with her daughter clutched tightly to her chest. She had no money and no job. No way to feed her child, until a gray haired man walked up to her and introduced himself as the mayor of the town and told Ewa to follow him. Ewa fell in step behind the man until he walked into a house where an older woman with many children was fixing dinner with the help of several of the children prepping the vegetables and potatoes. The elderly woman took charge of Ewa and her child and gave them jobs to do. Ewa had been accepted into this agglomerated family and followed the woman's instructions in helping raise the children and doing jobs around the village for other families.

In 235 AD. Edward DiMare saw his first opportunity and began a series of invasions and assasinations that lasted for over 50 years as each new Roman Emperor was replaced by the next military hero so that a total of 25 Emperors were cut down on a regular basis. Finally, Diocletian, the Roman Emperor in 285 partitioned the Roman Empire into the Eastern and Western Roman Empires.

MAX goes on to explain how Vlad Dracul's murderous exploits as a defendant of his castle and native loyalty of the region he lived in. It was only later in oral tales that the story of Dracula evolved over time and began to appear in literature and then film. MAX states, "It may have been an element of Cusslerite used in the body armor that Vlad Dracul wore in his battles to defend his native land that transformed him into a murderous beast. " Dirk was mollified but something in his mind put two and two together but still somehow knew that the true answer stll lay within his grasp.

From 235 AD to 285 AD Edward DiMare used three men who either were members of the Roman Army or had placed a man in the Army and used each one to make sure no strong leader emerged from the military to provide any strong influence in the selection of the Roman Emperors. Ambrosair, Donalian and Eolan were Edward's puppets of influence by killing or plotting against anyone who emerged as a strong influence in the Roman Army and the politics of Rome.